


here's to the glory still to be

by foxfireflamequeen



Series: those who move mountains [1]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Age Regression/De-Aging, M/M, Post-Series, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-27
Updated: 2017-03-27
Packaged: 2018-10-11 06:43:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10457838
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/foxfireflamequeen/pseuds/foxfireflamequeen
Summary: “Hi,” says Viktor, smile bright and camera-ready. His hand, when he extends it, is small and delicate. “I think you know who I am, but we haven’t met.”His accent is very thick, very Russian in a way Yuri has never heard before. He looks from the offered hand to Viktor’s face, barely an inch higher, and tracks his hair, long and pale and spilling over his shoulders. He can’t be older than, well, Yuri.“No,” says Yuri. “We haven’t.”





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Val_Creative](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Val_Creative/gifts), [TripCreates](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TripCreates/gifts).
  * Translation into Slovenčina available: [here's to the glory still to be](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12931107) by [splendid_sun](https://archiveofourown.org/users/splendid_sun/pseuds/splendid_sun)



> Warning for teenage athletes, and butchered skating history. I apologize to everyone whose careers I stole from, particularly Plushenko, but in my defense Viktor is basically Plushenko with more embellishment. [mixedbird](https://mixedbird.tumblr.com/post/166958569447/commission-for-foxfireflamequeen-for-her-fic) did a beautiful commission for this fic; please check out their other works!

 

 

 

 

 

“What the fuck,” Yuri says, looking from Katsuki to Yakov and back again. “Am I hallucinating?”

Katsuki doesn’t reply. His lips are pinched together, eyes big and unhappy, and Yuri doesn’t know what’s worse, that he’s making that stupid face at all, or that Viktor isn’t doing anything to help it.

“No,” Yakov tells him. “It’s not a hallucination.”

“Hi,” says Viktor, smile bright and camera-ready. His hand, when he extends it, is small and delicate. “I think you know who I am, but we haven’t met.”

His accent is very thick, very Russian in a way Yuri has never heard before. He looks from the offered hand to Viktor’s face, barely an inch higher, and tracks his hair, long and pale and spilling over his shoulders. He can’t be older than, well, Yuri.

“No,” says Yuri. “We haven’t.”

 

 

 

Viktor is sixteen, fresh off the podium with his very first record-breaking performance at Junior Worlds, twelve years ago. He’s intensely polite, sits with impeccable posture on the floor of the living room with Makkachin in his and Katsuki’s apartment, and doesn’t want to know anything about his adult life.

“If you tell me now,” he says, smiling, always smiling. “Where’s the surprise?”

“Seriously?” Yuri says, disgusted. “You’re sitting in some stranger’s apartment and you don’t want to know how you got here?”

Viktor cuts his eyes to where Katsuki is quietly fiddling with the ring on his finger. Viktor’s hands are bare. His ring is too big on him now. It sits on the table in front of them, untouched since Viktor put it down.

“I can guess some things,” he says, succinct, and it’s only then that Yuri realizes they’ve been speaking in Russian the whole time. Viktor has, effectively and knowingly, cut Katsuki out of the conversation.

Viktor, at sixteen, is _mean_.

 

 

 

Yakov makes a number of really long phone calls, takes Katsuki aside to have an even longer hushed conversation, then leaves them alone with a promise to find out more by tomorrow. Yuri wanted to leave with him, but he gets the feeling Katsuki is using him as some sort of human shield, and he’s really not cruel enough to leave him at Viktor’s mercy.

“So,” Katsuki starts after a painfully awkward few minutes of silence after Yakov’s departure. “I ordered pizza.”

“Pizza?” Viktor repeats, like he doesn’t know what that is. Yuri and Katsuki exchange a startled glance, suddenly realizing that if Viktor was training under Lilia Baranovskaya from age seven, over a decade ago when ordering food wasn’t as much of a thing, he might actually not know what pizza is. God knows Yuri hasn’t had pizza in about a year.

“Don’t worry, you like pizza,” Katsuki reassures quickly. Something shutters in Viktor’s expression.

“I’m sure I do,” he says.

 

 

 

Viktor doesn’t like pizza. He eats one slice and nibbles at a second while Yuri, at the same age with the same kind of metabolism, devours seven. Katsuki looks like he doesn’t know if he should fuss or not.

“We can order something else if you don’t like it,” he tries, and Viktor offers him a magazine-worthy smile.

“I’m full, actually,” he says, which can _not_ be true. Yuri tells him so.

“We can’t all be little piggies like you,” Viktor replies with his meanest smile. Yuri sits back, honestly amazed.

“Wow,” he says. “You are _such_ an asshole.”

Viktor smiles at him some more and feeds the rest of his slice to Makkachin.

 

 

 

“I didn’t expect him to be so—different,” Katsuki muses, fluffing the pillows on what is, technically, _Yuri’s_ bed. Not that Yuri would ever say that out loud, because then he’d have to admit that he spends more time in this room than in the one that’s actually his in Lilia’s house. He smooths out the leopard print duvet and picks up the stuffed tiger on the desk. This Viktor doesn’t know them, doesn’t particularly care about them, and giving him ammunition is a bad idea.

“He’s not _that_ different,” he says. “He’s always been a mean son of a bitch. Now he’s just more open about it.”

Katsuki shakes his head. “It’s not that,” he says. “He’s different.”

Yuri supposes he’d know best. Except maybe Yakov, who actually did know Viktor at sixteen. But Yakov was never very good at understanding Viktor. From what Yuri can tell, no one has ever been very good at understanding Viktor, not even Katsuki, who’s come the closest.

Katsuki looks at him. “He’s like you,” he says, and Yuri blinks. This is the first time he’s heard that, _he’s like you_ , instead of _you’re like him_. It’s strange, and frankly untrue.

“Come on,” he jerks a thumb over his shoulder at the door instead of telling Katsuki all the ways in which he’s wrong. “We should go out there. It’s past the baby’s bedtime.”

That gets him a smile. “He’s the same age as you,” Katsuki calls behind him, and Yuri feels inordinately pleased with himself as he walks back out to where Viktor is brushing Makkachin out in the kitchen.

“Your room is ready,” Yuri tells him, in Russian because that’s how Viktor seems to prefer it. Viktor doesn’t stop petting the gray fur around Makkachin’s muzzle.

“This morning he was just a puppy,” he says, quiet. “And now he’s _old_.”

Yuri thinks about what it must be like, to suddenly wake up in a strange place with strange people and a dying dog, everyone acting like they know you when you don’t know anyone at all. He thinks it must be pretty shitty.

“Does your Yakov have hair?” he asks, curious.

“No,” Viktor says. He kisses Makkachin’s nose. “Yakov is _very_ old.”

 

 

 

Yuri goes home and calls Otabek.

“Give him a break,” Otabek says after he’s listened to Yuri rant for an hour about how much of a dick sixteen year-old Viktor is. He didn’t stop for a second to question if Yuri was lying to him, just accepted the facts of time travel as is. There are many reasons Yuri likes Otabek, and he adds this to the list. “He’s probably freaked out. He’s a kid.”

“He’s my age!” Yuri says, and Otabek rolls his eyes.

“ _You’re_ a kid,” he points out, then stalls Yuri before he can explode from rage. “It’s not a bad thing, Yuri, just a fact.”

“You’re not much older than me,” Yuri sulks. Otabek snorts at him.

“Yeah, and I’m not that old either. Figure skating years aren’t actual years, you know.”

“They might as well be,” Yuri says, and immediately wishes he hadn’t. No one knows how to respond when he says shit like that. They either try to tell him he’ll still have a life after skating, or that he’s too young to know better.

Otabek says, “Even in figure skating years, neither of us has really hit our prime. Can you imagine the height we’ll get on our quads at twenty, twenty-two? With the muscle to back it up?”

This is why Otabek is his favorite.

 

 

 

The next day, Katsuki brings Viktor to the rink. His distinctive hair is bundled into a bun under a hat, huge sunglasses on the half of his face not hidden by a massive hipster scarf. He’s wearing a shirt that’s long enough to be a dress, and leggings bunched up at his ankles to stop them from pooling on the floor.

Yuri realizes belatedly that this means he’s going to have to a) hand over some of his clothes, and b) probably hand over his extra pair of skates.

Yakov yells at Katsuki while Viktor goes to change into the extra set of clothes Yuri keeps in his locker, then yells at Viktor when he comes out wearing Yuri’s battered skates. Yuri has never seen anyone shrug off Yakov the way Viktor does, so thoroughly confident that Yakov will forgive him no matter what. He’s also never seen anyone else turn Yakov into that particularly disturbing shade of purple.

He loses track of Yakov and his rinkmates fussing over Viktor, practicing the quad flip that edged him off the podium at Worlds. He steps out of it for the fifth time in a row and is so frustrated he wants to tear at his hair.

“You’re very good,” he hears from behind him, and considers punching Viktor in the face. It’s the validation he’s always wanted, from a Viktor who can’t even do his signature jump yet. This is so fucked up.

“What the fuck do you want,” Yuri grits out when it becomes evident that Viktor won’t go away. “Can’t you go bother Yakov instead? Or your fiancé?”

Viktor shrugs. “He’s not my fiancé yet,” he says dismissively. “I hear you won GPF gold last season. I saw your routines.”

Yuri digs his toe pick into the ice and glares. “What do you care?”

Viktor blinks at him. “You’re very good,” he says again, sweet now where he was matter-of-fact before. He wants something, Yuri thinks, and wonders why he’s here. Katsuki would give Viktor anything he asked.

“Look,” he tries, annoyed. “I don’t have time for you. I have to get this right.”

“You can already do a quad Lutz,” Viktor points out. “Well enough to show me how.”

 

 

 

Every skater in the world knows Viktor Nikiforov’s career trajectory by heart.

At fifteen, Viktor landed the very first quadruple Salchow in competition, and won the Junior GPF. At sixteen, he broke the Junior FS record with zero quads in his routine and multiple split flips, and won the Junior World Championships. At seventeen, he became the first male skater to medal at the GPF in his senior debut, the first male skater to do a Biellmann in seniors. At twenty, he started choreographing his own programs, and medaled at the Olympics. At twenty-one, he landed the first quad Lutz in competition, patented the quad-toe-triple-toe-triple-loop combination, and broke another world record. At twenty-two, he landed the first quad flip in competition, which would become his signature jump, and the first six-jump combination in history. From twenty-three to twenty-seven, he won gold at every single competition he participated in, including the two Olympics, setting new and higher records every other year. At thirty, it’s very possible that he’ll win his third consecutive Olympic gold, no matter how hard Yuri, Otabek, Katsuki, and Leroy try to stop him.

There have been great skaters in the past, and there will be great skaters in the future. Yuri will be better than Viktor someday. Katsuki might become better than Viktor in time. But no one else will have done it _first_.

Without Viktor, the rest of them wouldn’t _be_ here.

This can’t be real, Yuri thinks, watching Viktor Nikiforov slam gloved palms onto the ice to prevent breaking his nose.

This can’t be real, he thinks, telling Viktor Nikiforov to pull in his shoulders as he rotates, watching him fall and fall again and look to _Yuri_ for advice.

This is real, he thinks, when Viktor Nikiforov finally lands a clean quadruple Lutz and skates over to throw his arms around Yuri, sweaty and stinky and solid and _warm_.

 

 

 

“I’m going back to Japan,” Katsuki announces a few days later while Viktor is at the rink, practicing his quad sals under Yakov’s watchful, and admittedly more experienced eye.

Yuri can’t believe what he’s hearing.

“You’re letting him kick you out of your own apartment?” he demands, crushing the urge to grab Katsuki’s suitcase and upend it on the floor. Impulse control. He’s learning it.

“He doesn’t like me,” Katsuki says plaintively, then sighs when Yuri opens his mouth to argue. “Okay, but I make him uncomfortable. You know I do.”

Viktor has been nothing but polite to Katsuki, but his smiles are razor-edged and he speaks in Russian around him more often than not. He doesn’t _dis_ like Katsuki, Yuri doesn’t think, but he doesn’t _want_ him. Katsuki isn’t shiny enough to hold this Viktor’s attention.

“It’s not you,” Yuri tells him. “He’s a shallow idiot.”

Katsuki laughs. “Oh, no, he’s _attracted_ to me,” he says, and Yuri does _not_ want to know how he knows that. Viktor hasn’t made any incredibly inappropriate overtures like his adult self would have, at least not in Yuri’s presence. “He just hates that I think I know him.”

“You do know him,” Yuri points out. “You’re _marrying_ him, though fuck knows why.”

“Yurio,” Katsuki says patiently. “I don’t know him. He’s a completely different person. He doesn’t have the same experiences. He doesn’t want the same things. And he’s definitely not ready to be engaged, let alone to some stranger who just assumes he likes pizza. This Viktor—he was my first love, do you understand?”

“Gross,” says Yuri.

“I didn’t know him then, but he was,” Katsuki continues, ignoring him. “So I _feel_ like I know him, even though I don’t. He doesn’t like that, since he definitely doesn’t know me. Don’t you get it? He likes you because you don’t act like he’s Viktor.”

“He doesn’t like me,” Yuri says reflexively, then, “It’s just because we’re the same age,” then, “But he’s _not_ Viktor.”

“Yeah,” Katsuki agrees. “He’s not our Viktor. But you’re the only one who treats him that way.” He looks at Yuri speculatively. “I think it’s because you didn’t know he even existed when he was this age. You didn’t know him at all until he was, what, twenty?”

“Twenty-four,” Yuri says. He remembers it so clearly, Viktor Nikiforov reaching out to shake his hand, offering him history’s greatest senior debut in exchange for Yuri not breaking his body before he was fifteen. His hair was already cut short then.

“Twenty-four,” Katsuki repeats. “My age. God, you’re both so _young_.”

This is not a conversation Yuri wants to have. Even Katsuki, one of the kindest skaters Yuri knows, looks at him with envy sparking in his eyes when Yuri holds an Ina Bauer for ten spins without straining, when he warms up faster than anyone else at the rink and goes to bed while Viktor and Katsuki are still soaking their feet.

“He can go stay with Yakov if he doesn’t want to be here,” Yuri changes the subject, because that’s easier. “You can’t give up training just because Viktor’s a dick.”

“It’s the off-season, and it’s not forever,” Katsuki says firmly. “Minako will take over my training while I’m there, and I’ll keep practicing at the Ice Castle. Viktor and I were going to go visit this month anyway; we were going to ask you to come along.”

“I can come along now!” Yuri offers, thinking of katsudon and Yuko, and maybe even the triplets, but Katsuki shakes his head.

“I want you to stay here,” he says.

“Here,” Yuri parrots. “As in, _your apartment?_ Are you _crazy?_ ”

“Viktor can’t stay here by himself,” Katsuki says, like this actually sounds _reasonable_ to him. “Look, he’s alone, he doesn’t really know how the future works—” They both wince at the memory of Viktor trying to figure out the new YouTube layout and hitting porn instead, and the resulting multiple teenage boners from Viktor and Yuri being there at the same time. “—and he could use a friend. He likes you.”

“What if I don’t like him?” Yuri wants to know.

Katsuki snorts. “Okay. _Do_ you not like him?”

Yuri elects not to respond, because Katsuki’s right. This Viktor is nothing like the Viktor they know. This Viktor isn’t a living legend yet, or someone who’s found meaning in life aside from skating. This Viktor has another living legend to catch up to, just like Yuri.

“You’re handling this remarkably well,” he says instead, and Katsuki gives him the kind of sardonic look Yuri wouldn’t have thought him capable of a year ago. Katsuki was a different person too, before Viktor barreled into his life.

“Trust me, Yurio,” he says. “I’m really, really not. Last night I tried to touch his shoulder and Makkachin put himself between us.”

Yuri winces. Makkachin adores Katsuki, sometimes more than he likes Viktor, but at the end of the day he’s _Viktor’s_ dog. “You shouldn’t go. Don’t let him push you around.”

“I’m not,” Katsuki says clearly. “I came here to learn from Viktor, and be with him. Viktor isn’t here right now. I’ll be back when the preseason starts to train under Yakov, or when Viktor comes back. Whichever comes first.”

Neither of them mentions the possibility that Viktor might not come back.

 

 

 

Viktor looks between the two empty rooms in the apartment, then announces, “I’m taking the couch.”

Yuri has zero problems with that, because he doesn’t want to sleep in Viktor and Katsuki’s room either.

 

 

 

At practice, Yakov makes them spot each other. Viktor only has one and a half quads under his belt right now so he doesn’t need much spotting, but Yuri has three to practice, plus the quad flip that he wants so bad he can taste it. Viktor skates up to him as he stops for a gulp of water, shaking his hair loose from its ponytail to tie it back up again.

“Is that all you care about?” he asks, almost disdainful. “Jump, jump, jump?”

Yuri gapes at him. This, from the boy who will revolutionize figure skating jumps.

“Do _you_ not care about jumps?” he retorts. “I seem to remember someone asking me for advice on the Lutz.”

“I’m good at jumps,” Viktor says, because what is humility. “And jumps are good for surprises. That’s not all I care about.”

“Okay,” Yuri says. “What do you think I should care about?”

“Making your body last,” Viktor tells him, blunt. “The way you do quads now, your hips and ankles will give out in five years, and then where will you be?”

Yuri crosses his arms. “I intend to be the best,” he says. “I need the quads.”

“I intend to be the best too,” Viktor’s eyes spark with something like determination. “I intend to be the best for a long, long time. That’s not going to happen if I just keep doing things anyone else could do if they _tried_ hard enough.”

“You don’t want to do old things better; you want to do new things.” Yuri considers this, thinks of older Viktor going on and on about ‘surprising the audience’. “You got ideas?”

Viktor grins at him, with teeth. “I have ideas.”

 

 

 

The really fucked up thing is that this Viktor _gets_ it, in a way the older Viktor seems to have forgotten. He understands what it’s like to reach, reach, reach for the sky, try for the impossible and succeed. He understands what it’s like to be the only one who _can_. Yuri can say shit to him like, “I’ll have time for a break when I retire,” and instead of making him take a break anyway Viktor will nod seriously and distract Yakov while Yuri attempts another quad flip. When they take off their skates it’s not just Yuri’s feet that are bruised and bleeding, but Viktor’s too. They stand at the barre in Lilia’s studio and push each other’s legs higher, hold them there when their thighs start burning.

They’re not stupid, either of them. They know what they’re doing to their bodies. Yuri, at least, knows exactly what it takes for twenty-eight year-old Viktor to get out of bed in the morning, the hip exercises and hot water bags at night. This Viktor’s seen it too, in older skaters, in Yakov who needs a cane to walk on rainy days.

Otabek frowns at him when he hears.

“Aren’t you overdoing it?” he asks.

“Yeah,” says Yuri. “But I’m not doing as many jumps now. Just working on the flip.”

Otabek looks faintly surprised. Yuri snorts at him.

“Viktor’s got a point,” he says, only a little irritated at having to admit it. “Why bother being the best if I can only be the best for like, five years? Viktor was the best for over a decade; that’s why he’s a _legend_.”

“What about after that decade?” Otabek asks, quiet and serious in the way he gets when he’s concerned and trying not to show it. Yuri should tell him sometime how the furrow in his brows gives him away.

“I only have twelve, fourteen years, Beka,” Yuri shakes his head. His hair, almost past his shoulders now, flops into his eyes. “After that, I’ll figure it out. Until then, this is all that matters.”

“Until then, everything else has to wait,” Otabek says. He doesn’t look too happy about it, but, “I get it.”

Yuri lets out the breath he didn’t know he was holding.

 

 

 

Giacometti calls. Honestly, Yuri’s just surprised that it took this long.

“You didn’t think you could’ve let me know?” he demands as Yuri brings his phone out to the living room where Viktor is watching the X-Files with Makkachin draped over his lap. Yuri’s still not sure how both of them fit onto the couch. “He hasn’t answered my messages in a month, or posted on Instagram! I thought he was dead, or, fuck, Makkachin was!”

“He doesn’t know you,” Yuri warns, bored. He’s not entirely sure when he became Viktor’s keeper, but he’s willing to blame Katsuki for this. “And he’s banned from social media, considering, y’know, the _time travel_.”

“You don’t even know if it’s time travel,” Giacometti says. “Let me talk to him.”

“It’s your bff,” Yuri says in response to the inquisitive look Viktor sends his way, and tosses him the phone. “Reply to your messages, asshole.”

“B-F-F?” Viktor spells out, eyebrows raised. “Is this another 2000s thing?”

“Oh my god,” says Giacometti. “You really are stuck in the 90s. It means best friend, Nikiforov.”

Viktor glances at his screen, then does a double take when he sees what’s on it. “ _Chris?_ ”

“Hello, Vitya.” Yuri can hear the smugness in Giacometti’s voice all the way from here. He looks over from the TV just in time to catch Viktor closing his mouth, the tips of his ears bright pink. “I got hot, I know.”

“I,” Viktor starts, then stops. “Your _hair_ ,” he says, strangled.

“What?” Giacometti asks. “You don’t like it?”

“Your curls were cute,” Viktor says, which, they were not. Yuri’s seen pictures.

“My curls never made you look at me like _that_ ,” Giacometti is clearly enjoying himself. Viktor laughs, bright and startled.

Yuri’s heart stutters, the anger so sudden and blinding he doesn’t know what to do with himself. Katsuki said Viktor liked him, but Yuri’s never made him laugh like that. Katsuki said Viktor liked him because Yuri didn’t know Viktor back then, but Giacometti did, and clearly Viktor likes _him_ , too.

“You’re _fourteen_ ,” Viktor is saying, and, “Are we really best friends?” and, “Did it happen before or after you got hot?”

Yuri forces his fists to unclench and stands up. He opens his mouth to say goodnight, but for the first time in nearly a month, Viktor isn’t paying attention to him.

He leaves before he can say something he’ll regret, closes the door to his room and leans against it.

_Fuck_ , he thinks, because that about sums it up.

 

 

 

He considers calling Otabek, then Katsuki, but even he can recognize a terrible idea when it’s about to kick him in the ass.

Viktor’s voice floats through the door for the next few hours, accompanied by laughter and Makkachin’s excited barking.

Yuri muffles his enraged screams into a pillow.

 

 

 

Viktor is inordinately happy the next day, waltzing around the kitchen with his dog to the Anastasia soundtrack. It’s like he got laid or something, which, Yuri didn’t _hear_ anything inappropriate last night, but with Viktor and Giacometti, who the fuck knows. Yuri isn’t sure how old they were when they started fucking, but it couldn’t have been long after Viktor turned eighteen.

“Yuri!” Viktor catches him trying to edge past the couch and drops Makkachin’s front paws. “Come dance with me! Makkachin has awful coordination!”

“He’s a dog,” Yuri says. “I’m heading to the rink.”

Viktor is undeterred, watching him back away slowly with a shark-like smile. “Yakov said he’ll kill us if we go in today.”

Yuri scoffs. “Since when do you listen to Yakov?”

“Since I realized rest days are actually important,” Viktor says cheerfully, and before Yuri knows what’s happening he’s vaulted over the couch and grabbed Yuri’s wrists. “Come on, Chris said there are like, twenty new Disney movies!”

So it _doesn’t_ bother him that Chris acts like he knows him already, even though they’re not supposed to be friends yet. Yuri feels his face twist into an ugly scowl.

“I don’t want to watch Disney with you,” he can hear the vitriol in his voice, can see it in the surprise widening Viktor’s eyes. “We’re not _friends_ , Viktor. You don’t _have_ friends, and I already have all the friends I need.”

He wrenches his hands from Viktor’s grasp and shoves him hard enough that he falls onto his ass. “I’m better than you,” he says, and something in him knows he’s talking to the wrong person, but he doesn’t know how to stop. “Do you get it, Viktor? _I’m better than you_. You’re washed up, you’re old and slow, you’re never going to be the best again, and you might as well be _dead_.”

Viktor climbs to his feet. His hair is a tangled mess, falling over his face in a long curtain, and Yuri is completely unprepared when Viktor sets his shoulders, plants his feet, and punches him right in the face.

“ _Fuck_ ,” Yuri gasps, staggering into the wall, clutching at his throbbing cheek. His vision grays out for a second, and when he blinks back into focus Viktor is still there, shaking out his fist and looking like he’s considering a second punch. Makkachin stands next to him, sixty pounds of protective dog held back only by Viktor’s hand on his head. Yuri’s never heard Makkachin growl before.

“I don’t know what your problem with him is,” Viktor says through gritted teeth, breathing through his anger in a way that’s achingly familiar. “But I’m not him, and you don’t get to shove me around.”

_My problem is with you_ , Yuri doesn’t say, because he’d forgotten he wasn’t talking to the older Viktor, the one who had a vicious temper but always, always reigned it in. This Viktor is sixteen, figure skater strong, and has clearly landed a punch before.

Yuri rubs his cheekbone, which is no doubt turning spectacularly purple, and gathers his dignity. “I’m going to the rink,” he says, and leaves.

Viktor doesn’t stop him.

 

 

 

“Um,” he hears Mila before he sees her. “Did you walk into a door or something?”

Yuri pulls the cold pack away to glare at her better. “Viktor punched me,” he says.

Mila leans against the row of lockers and stares at him. “I’m sorry,” she says. “But it sounded like you said Viktor punched you.” Yuri glares harder. “ _Viktor_ punched you? _Our_ Viktor?”

“He’s not our Viktor,” Yuri says tiredly, putting the cold pack back on his cheek. “I don’t fucking know. I was mad, said some shit, pushed him a little, and suddenly there’s a fist in my face.”

Mila bites her lip, and Yuri can tell she’s trying to figure out a nice way to put whatever she’s thinking of saying. He wishes she’d just spit it out.

“Look, Yuri,” she starts. “I’m not saying he should’ve punched you. Don’t condone violence, blah blah, you get the point. But frankly, the only reason you’ve never gotten punched before is because everyone you know is _older_ than you.”

“I’m not a kid,” Yuri spits, disgusted. He balances on his skate guards and moves to stand, but Mila puts a hand on his shoulders and pushes him back down.

“You are to us. Hell, sometimes _I_ want to punch you.” She snorts. “Who would’ve guessed it would take time travel for you to meet your match, but now that I think about it, who else could be your equal than _Viktor Nikiforov_.”

It’s so, so stupid, but Yuri feels a surge of pride. Mila thinks Viktor Nikiforov is his _equal_.

“I probably shouldn’t have pushed him,” he mutters after a moment. Mila pats his head, like he’s a puppy or something.

“You probably shouldn’t have said whatever it is you did, either,” she says. “What did he do that got you so mad, anyway? I thought you two were getting along.”

_I got mad because he made a friend who wasn’t me_ , Yuri thinks, which makes no sense even to him.

“Whatever,” he says instead. “Doesn’t matter anymore,” he adds, which is a blatant lie.

Mila hums. “You’re not supposed to be here today, but as long as you are, wanna try a death spiral again?”

“ _No_ ,” Yuri says, horrified. “Shut up, _baba_.”

Mila shoves at his shoulder, friendly and familiar, and Yuri determinedly doesn’t think about how cruel it was of him to throw Viktor’s loneliness in his face.

 

 

 

“Maybe you should go home tonight,” Mila tells him as he’s packing up at the end of the day. “See your cat, talk to Otabek. You could both probably use some space.”

 

 

 

Viktor was likely planning on ignoring him, but the carrier catches his interest when Yuri plops it on the table. He glances at Makkachin, whose tail has already started wagging, and bites his lip.

“I shouldn’t have punched you,” he blurts, just as Yuri says, “Here, have a cat.”

They blink at each other. “You brought me a cat?” Viktor says finally, eagerly, and yeah, Yuri might be cheating a little. Older Viktor loves his cat to pieces, and this Viktor probably likes animals too.

“She’s my cat,” Yuri corrects. “But Makkachin likes her, and if I’m gonna stay here for much longer I didn’t want to leave her at Lilia’s.”

Viktor is already unzipping the carrier, sitting back to watch big green eyes squint at him suspiciously.

“She’s so _pretty_ ,” Viktor coos as she edges her nose forward to sniff his offered finger.

“Her name’s Misha,” Yuri says proudly, because she _is_. “She doesn’t like to be picked up.”

She doesn’t like anyone other than Yuri, actually, and Viktor and Makkachin, for reasons unknown. Lilia hates her guts.

Misha knows this apartment, because Yuri brings her by whenever he’s staying longer than a night. She doesn’t bother looking around, just crawls out of her carrier, meows at Makkachin, leaps onto the couch, and promptly settles in Viktor’s lap.

“Oh, wow,” Viktor says, petting her carefully. “I can’t believe you brought me a cat just so you wouldn’t have to say sorry.”

Yuri scowls at him. “I didn’t hear you apologize either.” He points at his face. “Look at this; it’s going to take a couple _weeks_ to go away.”

Viktor looks guilty. “Does it hurt?” he asks.

“ _Yes_ ,” Yuri says, even though it doesn’t much anymore. He’s had worse bruises from skating falls, but he figures Viktor deserves to feel a little guilty.

Makkachin tries to dig his nose into Yuri’s crotch, which is probably his way of saying Yuri’s forgiven. They sit quietly for a while, Misha purring loud as a motorboat, Makkachin a heavy weight draped over Yuri’s legs.

“I’m strong too,” Yuri says eventually. “But I can’t punch like that. You get into a lot of fights?”

Viktor doesn’t say anything for long enough that Yuri’s about ready to give up, but then he sighs.

“I live in an all-boys dorm, I wear leotards and sparkles and makeup and my hair is longer than most girls’.” He smiles, thin and brittle and definitely not worth a picture. “Yeah, Yuri, I get into fights.”

Yuri bites the inside of his cheek and counts to three, pushing down the instinctive rage. “I thought you lived with Yakov,” he says when he’s got himself mostly under control.

“I used to, now I don’t,” Viktor replies, and Yuri figures that’s all he’s going to learn about that.

“They let you keep a dog in the dorms?” he asks, thinking of Makkachin on the warpath like he’s never seen before.

Viktor’s eyes could cut glass. “I’m Viktor Nikiforov,” he says. “I’m Russia’s treasure. I get a few perks.”

“Right,” Yuri says, only a little intimidated. “Me too.”

Viktor doesn’t laugh at him, but Yuri gets the feeling it’s a near thing.

 

 

 

Otabek doesn’t laugh at him either, but that’s just a technicality. Otabek raises both eyebrows and stares at him for so long Yuri hangs up on him in disgust, and when his phone starts ringing he almost lets it go to voicemail before deciding to pick up at the last second.

“Do you think Viktor did it so he’d be prettier than you,” Otabek wants to know. Yuri hangs up on him again.

 

 

 

Things settle down, after that. Yakov finds out about Yuri coming in on a rest day and bans him from the rink for two days in a row, then he figures out who gave him the black eye and relegates Viktor to the ballet studio for the two days that Yuri is forced to rest. By the time they both get back they’re so thirsty for the ice they’d do anything to stay, so Yuri doesn’t say anything stupid and Viktor keeps his mean commentary to himself. Makkachin and Misha get along with both of them, and they live off takeout and the occasional experimental cooking endeavor in what Yuri is starting to forget used to be older Viktor’s apartment.

He gets comfortable, _they_ get comfortable, which is probably why neither of them is prepared for it when Viktor walks in on Yuri jerking off in the bathroom.

Yuri looks at Viktor looking at him and comes all over his fist.

 

 

 

They don’t talk about it.

 

 

 

“Okay, seriously, the fuck are you guys doing?” Yuri shouts across the rink.

Mila cups her hands around her mouth and shouts back, “I’m showing Viktor how to use Snapchat!”

Viktor’s figured out most of the apps on his phone by himself, but there are a surprising few that elude him. Yuri isn’t even sure Viktor had Snapchat on his phone before Mila got her grubby hands on it. He skates over to see Viktor raise his arm up to take a selfie of him and Mila, and tap at the screen. Moments later Yuri’s phone buzzes where he left it on the boards.

It’s a disgustingly cute picture. Yuri screenshots it.

“Great, now we’re gonna get to see a thousand and one pictures of Makkachin in real time,” he says, like he’s not secretly thrilled. Yuri might be a cat person, but Makkachin is pretty great.

Viktor doesn’t look at him. His full attention is on Mila, head tilted inquisitively to one side, gazing up at her through his lashes. Yuri realizes with a start that he’s _flirting_.

“And you’re sure they don’t save the pictures?” he asks with a sweet smile, the one Yuri’s realizing he uses when he needs someone to like him, so he can get what he wants. It makes his cheeks look thinner, his face older.

Mila’s cheeks are pink. For all that she called Yuri a kid just a few days ago, she’s not actually much older than them. And this is _Viktor Nikiforov_.

Yuri feels his blood rush in his ears, and backs away before he ends up calling one or both of them a whore. He channels the rage into skating instead, throwing himself into the air again and again until his knees give out on him.

He doesn’t notice Viktor watching him land every single quad flip he attempts.

 

 

 

He’s curled up in bed with Misha, listening to a couple tracks Lilia wanted him to sample for his programs, when his phone lights up with a snapchat from Viktor. Yuri thumbs it open, resigned to grinning stupidly at a goofy picture of Makkachin for ten seconds.

It’s not a picture of Makkachin.

Yuri stares at his phone for the ten seconds it takes for the picture to fade, breath caught in his chest and throat painfully dry. He thinks of Viktor, right outside on the fucking _couch_ , raising his phone into the air and tilting his head back until he had the perfect angle to catch the most non-explicit explicit snapchat in history, just a shot of the pale, long line of his neck.

Yuri still hasn’t recovered when his phone buzzes again. He closes his eyes, takes a deep breath, and looks at it.

It’s a picture of Makkachin, snuffling into the camera.

_Okay_ , Yuri thinks. Okay, so Viktor is _clever_. It’s not like he didn’t know that. He’s clearly—testing the waters, or whatever. Viktor, who almost never says what he means, was never going to send him a straightforward nude.

Yuri, who also almost never says what he means, lies down on the bed, pulls down his tights, and snaps a photo of his half-hard dick. He double-checks to make sure it’s going only to Viktor, and hits send before he can change his mind.

He hears a thump outside, like someone dropped a phone on the carpeted floor. Yuri smirks to himself and waits for the next snapchat to light up his phone. After all, neither of them loses well.

Viktor doesn’t disappoint.

 

 

 

They don’t talk about that, either.

 

 

 

“The points system has changed,” Yuri argues loudly, going through his stretches in Lilia’s studio. “Why should I bother with crazy combinations when it won’t get me the _points?_ ”

“To be _memorable_ ,” Viktor shoots back, eyebrows raised like it’s obvious. “What’s the point of skating a technically perfect program if no one remembers it two days later? Can you name all of my programs off the top of your head?”

“What?” Yuri says, wrongfooted. “Not _all_ of them, but I can name most.”

Viktor eases into a split and bends forward, putting his face to the floor. “You can name the ones that were _memorable_. Let me guess, Lilac Fairy is up there, but not Swan Lake.”

“I know Swan Lake,” Mila says from the side, stretching her free leg into an Ina Bauer. “Lilia’s choreography. It was beautiful.”

“It was _boring_ ,” Viktor scoffs, sitting back up. “Unoriginal, uninspired, done a thousand times before. Lilia loved that program because she loves that damn composition, and I won my first Juniors gold with it, but no one will ever remember it.”

Mila rolls her eyes expansively. “It’s a competition, and you _won_ ,” she says. “What does it matter?”

Yuri watches Viktor’s polite mask crackle under the weight of his disdain. Viktor who grew out his hair despite the shit he must have gone through for it in an all-boys dorm, Viktor who will cut it all off when he returns from his year-long break after his injury. Viktor who will _quit_ when he realizes he can’t surprise his audience anymore.

There have been great skaters before, and there will be great skaters after. Legends are the ones you remember.

“Hydroblade’s popular,” Yuri says, thinking fast. “Fans love it.”

“It’s a copycat move, and it gets zero technical marks. Good for ice shows, not competition,” Mila tells him, but Yuri’s looking at Viktor.

“Hydroblade into a triple axel into a spread eagle,” he says. “I can do that.”

Viktor meets his eyes. “Bet you I can do it first.”

“You’re both crazy,” Mila tells them, but Yuri knows two things. One: Viktor will _not_ do it first, and two:

It’s not enough to win. Not for them.

 

 

 

Yuri sends Viktor one selfie that night, naked from the chest up, his GPF gold medal lying flat on the center of his chest.

Ten minutes later his phone lights up with a video of Viktor’s face, long hair splayed around him, tongue darting out to lick pearly white come off his fingers. The asshole even winks at him.

Yuri watches it once, replays it even though he _knows_ Viktor will know, then brings himself off in record time, _twice_.

 

 

 

Practice goes really fucking bad. Bad enough that when Viktor falls, he doesn’t get up, and they spend ten agonizing minutes waiting for him to wake up instead of calling an ambulance, because how would they explain a sixteen year-old Viktor Nikiforov to the world?

Yakov calls a friend of his instead, and an old lady shows up half an hour after Viktor blinks awake to shine a light into his eyes and proclaim he doesn’t have a concussion. Yakov wants to take him home and stay with him, but Viktor locks his fingers around Yuri’s wrist.

“I’m fine,” he says. “Yuri can come with me.”

The fall has shaken something loose in him. Yuri watches helplessly as Viktor rifles through the cabinets for his older self’s liquor stash and pours himself half a glass of vodka, face pale and fingers trembling. Makkachin whines at his feet, but Viktor snaps his fingers and points him into the kitchen.

“It’s just a fall, you big baby,” Yuri says, because he doesn’t know the first thing about comforting someone who doesn’t want it. “I’m sure you’ve had worse.”

Viktor pours vodka into another glass and pushes it into Yuri’s hands. “Drink,” he says, stalking over to sit on the couch. “Keep me company.”

Yuri rolls his eyes and takes a sip. It’s good vodka, the kind Lilia keeps in her home. Viktor’s probably broken into a special bottle. He sits on the coffee table and considers waiting Viktor out, but realistically speaking, he just doesn’t have that kind of patience.

“Seriously, what’s wrong with you?” he demands, and Viktor blurts, “I have to go back.”

Yuri puts down his glass.

“I don’t—I can’t stay here,” Viktor says, eyes big and desperate. “What am I going to _do?_ I don’t want to do hydroblades, I want to land the first quad flip in competition. I have programs to plan, records to break, but all the things I had planned for my life, they’ve already been _done_.”

“Yeah, well,” says Yuri. “Now you know how I feel.”

“Fuck you,” Viktor sneers, going from pleading to derisive so fast he gives Yuri whiplash. “You grew up knowing these things were possible. You were doing quads when you were twelve. Quad sals weren’t even a thing before me.”

Yuri snorts. “You give yourself too much credit. If you hadn’t done it, someone else would have.”

Viktor leans over the gap between them, loose hair spilling over his shoulders. “But I did do it,” he says, quiet and fierce. Yuri’s heart thuds in his chest. “I did all of it. Without me, there would be no _you_.”

What Viktor isn’t saying, what Yuri knows, is that there can’t be two. There can’t be two legends at the same time, two skaters at the top of the world. Yuri and this Viktor can’t exist in the same space, able to do the same things. It’s not _right_.

“Besides,” Viktor tilts his head, smile growing meaner by the second. “Don’t you want _your_ Viktor back?”

It’s a minor miracle that Yuri doesn’t throw the vodka in his face. It’s less of a miracle that Viktor doesn’t punch him again when Yuri plants both hands on his chest, shoves him back into the cushions, climbs into his lap, and kisses him.

 

 

 

Viktor kisses like he skates, like he wants to carve his name into the place between Yuri’s lips. When Yuri tugs his pants open he tilts his head back, lets Yuri sink his teeth into his skin and leave the kind of mark he’ll have to _remember_.

 

 

 

It’s not weird in the morning. Yuri is only slightly offended that Giacometti’s phone call put Viktor in a better mood than actually getting laid.

They eat their breakfast together and head out to the rink as usual, do warmup exercises before hitting the ice. Viktor tells Yuri exactly how awful his free leg is on the flip, and later, Yuri pushes Viktor’s shoulders down into his stretches in the ballet studio.

Viktor’s unbound hair pools on the wooden floor, parting at the nape of his neck. Yuri’s considering pressing his mouth to the pale stretch of skin when Viktor catches his eye in the mirror.

“Am I distracting you?” he murmurs, low enough that Mila doesn’t hear him, holding a beautiful arabesque on the other side of the room. Yuri edges closer to hide his erection against Viktor’s ass.

“Yeah, you are,” he says, matter-of-fact. “You ready to move to the barre?”

“Sure,” Viktor agrees, Yuri’s dick forgotten like a minor inconvenience. Really, they don’t have time for that shit.

 

 

 

It doesn’t really hit him until the end of the day, that he has no fucking idea what he’s doing. He ties his sneakers and looks up, and Viktor is there just like he expected, waiting for him with his duffel slung over one shoulder. Sixteen year-old Viktor, with a thick braid falling to his hips and face still round with baby fat, who should be twenty-eight with a slightly receding hairline and cheekbones that could cut glass.

Viktor, who’s supposed to be _engaged_.

“Oh, now you’re just stalling,” Viktor says impatiently when he notices Yuri sitting there staring at him. “Let’s _go_ ; Makkachin will be hungry.”

Yuri realizes, horrified, that he knows now that that’s Viktor’s way of saying _he’s_ hungry.

“I’ve gotten used to you,” he says nonsensically. Viktor raises his eyebrows, starting to look a little concerned.

“What?” he asks, and Yuri makes a decision.

“Look, go on ahead. I think I’ll head to Lilia’s tonight.”

He watches Viktor absorb that, sees his eyes darken as he comes to a not-entirely-wrong conclusion. His voice is flat with anger when he asks, “So is this you freaking out over the sex, or you freaking out over having sex with another guy?”

“It’s me freaking out over having sex with _you_ , you fucker,” Yuri hisses, equally furious and unwilling to temper it.

Viktor is startled into silence. “Oh,” he says after a moment.

“Yeah,” Yuri mutters to his shoes. He hears Viktor scuff his foot against the floor.

“Okay,” Viktor says finally, inscrutable. “I’ll take care of Misha until you’re ready to pick her up.”

Yuri wants to tell him that he’s not _leaving_ , that it’s just for one night, but honestly, he’s not totally sure. He lets Viktor walk away alone.

 

 

 

Both his options suck, but he feels more obligated to tell one than the other, and Yuri has never been a coward. He hits ‘call’ on his phone and counts the seconds in his head.

Katsuki picks up after the fourth ring. “Yurio!” he says, bright smile on his face just this side of expectant, and Yuri forgets his whole rehearsed speech.

“I had sex with Viktor,” he blurts at his screen.

Katsuki’s smile disappears. Yuri wishes he could snatch the words back, wishes he’d never said them, even as they ring in his ears. _I had sex with Viktor._

“I thought you were calling because he was back,” Katsuki says after an agonizing minute of quiet. He looks heartbroken. Yuri feels so guilty he could choke on it. “Stupid of me, I guess. I know he would’ve called me himself.”

He doesn’t say anything else. Yuri waits as long as he can, but he’s never claimed to be patient.

“I’m sorry,” he says. Katsuki manages to stop looking despondent for a second in favor of raising his eyebrows in surprise.

“What for?” he asks. Yuri stares at his pixelated face, dismayed. He’s not sure he can say those words out loud again.

“I—” he tries anyway. “ _Viktor_.”

“Oh,” Katsuki says, brows furrowed. “I don’t know what you want me to say about that.” Yuri bites his lip to keep his mouth shut and lets him think about it. Katsuki spreads his hands helplessly.

“He’s _sixteen_ , Yurio.”

“Yeah,” Yuri agrees. “He’s your first love.”

Katsuki considers this. “Maybe,” he says eventually. “But it sounds like he chose you. I don’t think you or I get to make that decision for him.”

“So you’re not mad?” Yuri asks, ashamed that he sounds like a child begging for reassurance, needing it anyway. Katsuki shakes his head.

“A little jealous, maybe,” he says, lips turned into a wry grin. “Not that I’m interested, he’s still too young for me, and back then I would have been too young for him, but it was a nice dream, you know? That I could have had him, if I’d known him.”

The weight doesn’t quite lift off his chest, but the rush of relief leaves him lightheaded. Yuri leans against the headboard and breathes through it.

“I’m not sure you would’ve wanted him then,” he says. “You were right; he’s different.”

He wants to say, _he’s mean, and overwhelming, and too talented to exist_.

He wants to say, _he’s like me._

Katsuki hums in agreement. “But you want him.”

“I don’t know,” Yuri tells him, honest. “I just know that he can’t stay.”

“Yeah,” Katsuki takes off his glasses to rub his face; there are dark shadows under his eyes. He’s gained a lot of weight over the past month and a half. Yuri would chalk it up to an off-season thing, but Katsuki eats when he’s upset.

“It’s funny, isn’t it,” Katsuki says after a moment. “If he stays, I lose him. If he goes, _you_ lose him.”

“This is so fucked up,” Yuri says, with feeling. Katsuki laughs; it sounds like giving up.

 

 

 

The thing is, regardless of what Yuri wants, he knows what he’d pick, if he had to choose.

The thing is, he knows what Viktor would choose, too.

It’s the reason Yuri wants him at all.

 

 

 

Viktor doesn’t keep all his medals and trophies in his apartment. As far as Yuri knows, the most recent ones stay with him, and the older ones are with Yakov. Which is why Yuri goes to his house with Lilia’s key instead of stopping by at the rink where he’ll have to see Viktor and deal with potential awkwardness. Yuri doesn’t have time for awkwardness when there’s a much better solution.

He texts Mila to make sure Viktor is at practice and gets back a snapchat video of a flawless quad Lutz. Viktor ends the jump facing the camera, chin lifted in wordless challenge, like he knows who the video is for. Yuri, infuriatingly, feels his own lips twitch into a smile.

Misha is annoyed with him when he gets back to the apartment, but for the most part both her and Makkachin are used to being left alone for long periods of time. Yuri gives Makkachin a thorough ear rub to make her jealous, orders an early dinner for himself, and takes a long shower just to use up all the hot water.

 

 

 

Viktor sends him a snapchat, a picture of the medal on the coffee table where it’s impossible to miss. He captions it, _does this mean you’re done panicking?_

Yuri takes a deep breath, holds his phone as high above his head as he can reach, and takes a selfie. No filters, no words. He hits send.

 

 

 

“Junior GPF 2001,” Yuri says when he hears the door open, staring at the ceiling so he doesn’t have to look at Viktor look at him. “Gold.”

He feels more than hears Viktor walk over, touch the medal warmed on Yuri’s skin. “Junior GPF 2014,” he says, smile in his voice. “Also gold.”

Yuri breathes in, then out. Viktor’s hand on his chest rises and falls with it. When he finally turns his head, Viktor isn’t even looking at his medal, which is flattering for a number of reasons. It gives Yuri the confidence he needs to wrap a hand around his dick and say, “You’re overdressed.”

There’s a short pause, then Viktor huffs out a laugh. “I suppose you want me to keep the medal on?”

Yuri grins back at him. “What would be the point, otherwise?”

 

 

 

It’s a pity, Yuri thinks when Viktor pulls him up by the medal to lick into his mouth, that they won’t get to do this again when they each have an Olympic gold to their name.

It’s less of a pity, he thinks, rutting up against the crease of Viktor’s hip, that in this at least, in the marks he leaves on Viktor’s skin, in the way Viktor looks at him like Yuri is someone to _chase_.

He gets to be the first.

 

 

 

Viktor smiles at him, fuck-drunk and sleepy, spread out over Yuri’s leopard print sheets like he belongs there. His sweat-damp hair sticks to Yuri’s shoulders.

“So were the medals a reminder for you,” he asks. “Or for me?”

Yuri thinks about it, about etching his name into Viktor’s skin with blood and ink and gold. Wonders if Viktor could carry a tattoo back with him, or a scar.

“Both,” he says, and lets Viktor draw him back into his arms.

 

 

 

They don’t let it become a distraction. Yuri catches himself looking at the long line of Viktor’s throat and throws himself into a combination spin instead of pushing him up against the boards. He sees Viktor watching him, too, tracking his mouth with bright blue eyes during water breaks, but he never skates close, always making sure to turn into Mila or Yakov.

Sometimes they both forget altogether, arguing over choreography and the stories they tell with their bodies. If they’re too tired after a day of hated off-ice training or ballet drills, they send each other nudes and jerk off on their own, Yuri in his bed and Viktor on the couch. If they have a little more energy Yuri leaves the door open and Viktor ventures into his room for something a little longer and a little less desperate. Those nights he spends curled into the curve of Yuri’s body, and Yuri pretends he’s not clinging to him like he’s afraid of letting go.

Katsuki calls more often, now, and smiles understandingly at the screen when Yuri tells him again that Viktor doesn’t want to talk. He chats with Yuri instead, tells him about the programs he’s planning on developing with Minako. Themes of love and loss.

Less and less, they talk about Viktor coming back.

 

 

 

Yuri doesn’t tell Otabek.

 

 

 

“ _At the end of the day_ ,” Viktor reads out loud from a magazine with his adult face on the cover. “ _All that matters is that I love skating. Win or lose, it’s enough for me to go out there and skate my best_.” He scoffs, tossing it aside. “Wow, I get really good at bullshitting.”

“What year is that?” Yuri leans over the table to look at the date. “Oh, that’s from last year. I don’t think you were bullshitting then.”

Viktor gives him a disbelieving look. “Are you serious?” he demands. “‘All that matters is that I love skating? If I just ‘loved skating’,” Yuri can hear the quotation marks around that, “I would work at a skating rink. No off-ice training required, no need to bust my feet on hard wooden floors, and definitely no need to spend thousands of rubles on top-notch equipment.”

Yuri rolls his eyes, spooning cereal into his mouth, “No one wants to hear you like _winning_. That sounds way too pretentious. You’ve had media training, why are you surprised?”

“I just thought the bullshit would be more original,” Viktor says, reaching over to snatch a dried strawberry out of Yuri’s bowl. “What do you say when you get questions like that?”

“I don’t know, no one really asks me how I feel about winning yet.” Yuri pulls his bowl into his lap, because now Misha thinks it’s okay to get at his cereal too. Viktor is a terrible influence at all ages, apparently. “They mostly just ask me how I feel about being Viktor Nikiforov two-point-oh.”

Viktor opens his mouth, and Yuri flicks milk at him. “Get over yourself,” he says. “You telling me no one asks you about Yagudin now?”

Viktor grins, all teeth. “They’ll stop, when I take the gold from him in the next Olympics.”

He won’t, Yuri knows. Yagudin will retire in another year, and Viktor won’t be recovered enough from the terrible injury he’ll suffer at eighteen to take gold in 2006. Yuri bites the inside of his cheek and doesn’t tell him when and where, doesn’t tell him to watch out for the nick in the ice that will send him crashing so hard Yakov will hear his bones break from across the rink.

“Where’d you find that, anyway?” he asks instead. “Thought you didn’t want to know too much about yourself.”

“I went into their room,” Viktor says, trying to act nonchalant. In another year or two he might actually hit the mark, but for now, all he looks is petulant. “I wanted to see all the medals I won’t win.”

Yuri drops his spoon, too irritated to keep eating. “Are you having an existential crisis?” he wants to know. “So you’re quitting, is that it?”

“I’m not _quitting_ ,” Viktor spits out the word like it leaves a bad taste on his tongue. “I’m just—managing expectations.”

“Right,” Yuri scoffs, fury curdling his tone. Misha yowls at him for attention, but he’s got none to spare. “Sounds like quitting to me.”

“What do you want me to do here?” Viktor snaps, losing his patience. It feels really fucking good to be the one putting that angry flush at the top of his cheeks. He’ll have that under control soon, but Yuri gets to see it now.

“It’s almost the start of preseason,” he continues after a moment, reaching out to pull Misha away from Yuri and into his lap. She goes easily, mollified by chin rubs. “Any other year I’d already have the music picked out for my programs by now, get started on choreography. I’m tired of wasting time. I might not be able to beat you this season, not with two quads, but I’m done sitting around waiting to go back. If you know a way to _send_ me back, I’m all ears. Otherwise, either help me or leave me alone.”

It’s not that he didn’t know this was a possibility, it’s more that Yuri had never seriously considered it. He’s been focusing on his training, letting Viktor push him to his limits and returning the favor, assuming this shit would just sort itself out.

“Hey,” he says eventually, when he’s fought down the instinctive panic-rage at the realization that that might not happen after all. “Do you _want_ to stay?”

The glare Viktor shoots him could curdle milk. “Why would I want to stay?”

“Uh, I don’t know,” Yuri kicks his feet under the table. Makkachin, dozing on the floor, wakes up enough to whuff at him. “Maybe because you’ve got friends here?”

Viktor is unimpressed. “I thought we weren’t friends,” he says, wry. Yuri shoves a spoonful of soggy cereal into his mouth and chews.

“I meant Giacometti and Mila, obviously,” he deflects when it becomes clear that Viktor won’t let him off the hook. “Just thought I’d ask. What are you even going back to?”

“Someplace where you’re not the only one who looks at me and _doesn’t_ see someone else,” Viktor says, gathering Misha up into his arms. He hesitates, then adds. “Someplace where you’re—not.”

The chair clatters loudly as Yuri pushes to his feet, hurt searing through his chest. “Someplace it’s _easier_ to be the best, you mean,” he manages, so angry he can’t think.

Viktor gazes up at him, eyes very blue, and very sad.

“Tell me, Yuri,” he says, quiet. “Do _you_ want me to stay?”

Yuri wonders what might happen to the future of skating, to now, if Viktor isn’t returned to his proper time before the season begins. His mind violently recoils from the thought.

“No,” he says, tired of this conversation. They both know what matters most to them. It does neither of them any good to pretend. “I don’t.”

 

 

 

That night, Yuri doesn’t leave his door open, but Viktor comes in anyway, Makkachin at his heels. He shoves at Yuri’s shoulder until he rolls over to make room, then slides into bed next to him. Makkachin drapes over their feet like a heavy blanket, Misha settling near their heads. It’s almost as if they _know_.

“I’ll help you,” Yuri declares into the dark, voice edged with steel instead of the tears dampening his pillow. “If you promise me something.”

He feels Viktor’s smile at the curve of his neck. “I’m not good at remembering promises.”

“Trust me,” Yuri says, dry. “I know. So make me a promise.”

“I promise if I go back, I won’t forget you,” Viktor whispers into his skin, soft as a secret.

“Shut _up_ ,” Yuri says, annoyed with himself for being pleased. It’s a sweet sentiment, but it’s pretty fucking clear that if Viktor does go back, he won’t remember anything of his time here. Otherwise it wouldn’t have taken him till twenty-one to land that quad Lutz. “That’s not what I meant.”

Viktor’s shoulders shake with silent laughter. “What do you want, then?”

_I want you to stay_ , Yuri thinks.

“I want you to not give up on going back,” he says.

Viktor stills against him. Makkachin, probably psychically attuned to Viktor’s moods, raises his head and whuffs in concern.

Yuri gives him a minute, then curls his fist into the thick hair at the back of his head. “Viktor,” he says, giving him a shake. “Promise.”

“Alright,” Viktor finally concedes, breath ghosting warm over Yuri’s throat. “I promise.”

 

 

 

Yuri wakes up in the middle of the night, alone in the bed save for Misha. The light is on in the living room, and he can hear Makkachin whining. He creeps to the door and presses his ear to the wood.

“Shh, Makka,” Viktor scolds. “You’ll wake Yuri.”

Makkachin quiets down. There’s a bit of shuffling; Yuri imagines Viktor settling on the floor with the big, old dog in his lap.

“I’m okay, sweetheart.” Viktor’s voice wobbles, hard. He’s such a fucking liar. “I’ll be okay.”

Makkachin is far more equipped to handle this than Yuri. He leaves them alone, and when Viktor eases back under the covers half an hour later he pretends to be asleep.

 

 

 

Yuri tells Otabek.

 

 

 

For the first time in their admittedly short friendship, Otabek doesn’t understand. The image quality on his front camera is awful, but Yuri can still tell he’s upset.

“I don’t get what you’re thinking,” Otabek says, and to his credit, he does look like he’s trying. Yuri doesn’t know what to tell him.

He shrugs and says, “He’s Viktor,” like that can explain anything to anyone who isn’t Katsuki. Otabek didn’t love the older version, and he sure as hell doesn’t love the younger one.

“But you said he was—mean,” Otabek parrots Yuri’s words back to him, perplexed. “You didn’t like him.”

“He is mean,” Yuri says. “He’s a bigger asshole than me, actually, and he has a bigger ego than Leroy’s. But he actually deserves to be that way.”

Something in Otabek’s face changes. “So it’s because he’s talented,” he says, with an undercurrent of hurt that Yuri doesn’t know what to make of. He didn’t say Otabek _wasn’t_ talented.

“Yes, but also no,” he says, halting. Who would’ve guessed that despite all his guilt, telling Katsuki would be easier? Katsuki didn’t need an explanation; he just _knew_. “Look, it’s not just that. Viktor—he wants the same things I do.”

“Which is what,” Otabek starts, chin turned up mulishly. “Do you think you’re the only ones who want to be the best? The only ones who are _capable_ of it?”

“We want what you already have, _Hero of Kazakhstan_ ,” Yuri retorts, because this is so, so stupid and how does Otabek not _see_ , when he’s already _been_ there, already _been_ the first, put a whole _country_ on the map in a way that can’t be _erased_. “To leave our marks on the world!”

Otabek looks taken aback. It’s the first time Yuri’s seen so much expression his face, but it’s not how he wanted to see it. He never wanted to fight with Otabek over _Viktor_.

“Why are you being such a dick about this anyway?” he pushes on when it becomes obvious Otabek won’t respond. “It’s not exactly any of your business.”

Otabek visibly bristles, brows drawn tight over his forehead. “Then why are you telling me?”

“Because you’re my friend!” Yuri snaps. “I _wanted_ to tell you, you idiot!”

“Oh,” Otabek says, drawn up short. “Well.”

“Yeah,” Yuri mutters, frustrated beyond belief. A minute passes in silence. Otabek opens his mouth, then closes it again.

“At least he’s good to look at,” he compromises eventually. It sounds like the best he can do.

Yuri is startled into a laugh, because yeah, Viktor is—he’s _beautiful_ , the kind of ephemeral beauty you can only be at sixteen. Viktor will keep being beautiful as he matures, if in a different way, and Yuri’s fairly sure he will too, but.

He doesn’t tell Otabek that they—Viktor, and Yuri—they’re not very beautiful on the inside. That that’s why they need people like Katsuki and Otabek around them. He doesn’t think that would go over very well.

 

 

 

On the ice, though, Viktor is beautiful in every way that matters. Sometimes Yuri looks at him and feels something burn in his chest that he wishes was jealousy, but it really, really isn’t.

 

 

 

Helping Viktor is harder than it sounds, because he has more ideas than he knows what to do with and every one of them ranges from mildly insane to impossible. His creativity is probably the only thing about him that Yuri can’t match. He watches Viktor come up with another ridiculous step sequence on the spot and feels inadequate, which in turn makes him angry.

“Oh,” Viktor says, staring at Yuri as he comes out of a combination spin, frozen halfway through his choreography.

“Spit it out,” Yuri says, too aggravated to deal with this, and Viktor blinks at him, dazed.

“That’s so useful,” he says, waving carelessly in Yuri’s general direction. Yuri’s about ready to bite his head off when he adds, “Channeling your feelings into energy. I wish I could do that.”

“ _Feelings_ ,” Yuri repeats, scornful. Viktor rolls his eyes.

“ _Anger_ , if that’s what you want to call it,” he says. “I know Lilia keeps telling you to calm down, but I don’t know why. Why not use that passion, when you clearly can?”

“Huh,” Yuri says, because that’s definitely not the advice the older version of Viktor gave. But this Viktor looks at him with his hands on his hips, considering.

“If you can show me how to do that,” he offers. “You can have the step sequence I saw you eyeing a while ago.”

Yuri’s not sure if what he’s asking for can be _taught_ , but Viktor has enough anger in him and that step sequence is beautiful enough for it to be worth a shot.

 

 

 

He’s not sure if Viktor keeps his promise, because he doesn’t remind him.

Turns out, it won’t matter.

 

 

 

Yakov and Lilia pull Viktor into the dingy little office in the corner of the rink no one ever uses, and they don’t come out for hours. When they do, Yakov looks _old_ , leaning heavily on each step as he walks. Viktor’s face is unreadable, but he turns to throw his arms around Yakov and holds on for a long time, face buried in the fabric of his coat. Yakov strokes his hair and it’s a familiar motion, like he’s done this many times before.

Lilia, standing ballerina-straight and awkward to the side, makes a few aborted attempts to touch Viktor’s shoulder. She half-raised him, too; less than Yakov, maybe, but he lived in her house and did homework at her dinner table when he was just a child. She’s still Lilia, though, so all she does in the end is offer him her hand for a shake.

Yuri hasn’t told Mila a thing, but she still puts a bracing hand between his shoulders when Viktor walks over to them. His eyes are on Yuri when he says,

“I’m going back.”

 

 

 

He thought he was ready for this.

He was wrong.

 

 

 

Viktor calls Katsuki.

“Please don’t trouble yourself coming back yet,” he says in heavily-accented English, honey-sweet and polite. His smile is flawless, apologetic and just that side of cruel. “I am sure your Viktor will call you when he gets back.”

Which will be _soon_ , apparently, because Viktor has completed whatever it was he was meant to do here, in this time. No one seems to know what that is, but Yakov and Lilia’s witchy contacts all assure them that the alignment of the stars or something equally asinine say it’s been done. Yuri didn’t stick around to hear the details.

Katsuki doesn’t look hurt, even though Viktor is actually putting effort into being unkind. “I’m sure Viktor will fly all the way to Japan instead of calling me, actually,” he says, smile stretching ear to ear. “Yurio, please make sure to call me.”

Yuri squints at the laptop over Viktor’s shoulder, hands busy wrangling Misha. He’d really rather not listen in on this train wreck, but both Viktor and Katsuki had insisted on putting the call on speaker. “I’ll let you know,” he says, because yeah, it’s very likely the older Viktor, bored of social etiquette, won’t have that forethought.

Viktor looks between them, then focuses back on the screen where Katsuki is trying badly to cover up a yawn. It’s very late in Japan.

“So, your Viktor,” he says, sounding out the English words with some unfamiliarity. “He’s… romantic?”

Yuri stops trying to wrestle Misha off the counter and stifles the urge to punch in that pretty, pretty face. Fucking Viktor, whose need to shock outweighs everything else.

“I thought you didn’t want to know about him,” Katsuki says, voice colored with surprise.

Viktor shrugs. “Not everything, but you are marrying him,” he says. “I am curious.”

Katsuki adjusts his glasses. It’s hard to see his eyes behind them, but Yuri thinks he looks speculative. “Viktor is—he’s Viktor,” he spreads his hands helplessly, which is all Yuri had been able to come up with too. “He goes after what he wants.”

“What he wants,” Viktor repeats carefully. Yuri realizes a little too late that he’s forgotten to look disinterested, and that Viktor has caught him staring out of the corner of his eyes. He flushes, hard. “That’s you, I suppose.”

Katsuki smiles at his screen, strangely fond of this person who isn’t his Viktor. “I don’t know,” he says, which, he’s an _idiot_. Yuri tells him so. Katsuki laughs, which is doubly annoying because Yuri doesn’t see what’s funny. “But I’m a happy idiot, Yurio.”

 

 

 

Yuri thinks it’s unfair that only one of them gets to be happy.

 

 

 

The sex that night edges on the wrong side of desperate, teeth clacking painfully together, Viktor’s nails raking down Yuri’s back in long, red lines. He presses Viktor into the sheets like he can hold him there and bites at his collarbone and Viktor says, “That won’t even scar, it’ll fade in a day, come _on_ , Yuri,” and Yuri kisses him hard enough to draw blood and says, “Shut up, shut up, shut _up_.”

 

 

 

After, Viktor sits up in bed, hair spilling down his shoulders and back like an ugly curtain, hiding the purple bruises and bites littering his chest. Yuri wants to tell him to tie it up, wants to cut into his skin to be sure the marks he left aren’t only skin-deep.

“I’m glad you have friends,” Viktor says, and Yuri’s mind flashes back to when he told Viktor, _you don’t_ have _friends_. “I know we don’t have time for—things like this,” he waves a hand between their naked bodies. “Not now. But I think it’s nice to have friends.”

“Nice,” Yuri scoffs, discreetly nuzzling into Viktor’s thigh. He’s not discreet enough, because Viktor brings his hand down to pet his hair.

“I’m going to miss you,” he says, soft enough that Yuri thinks he wasn’t meant to hear. He keeps his eyes closed, and pretends.

They’re both good at that.

 

 

 

In the end, it happens like this.

Yuri wakes up alone, Misha yowling in his face. The clothes Viktor was wearing last night, _Yuri’s_ clothes, are still on the floor of his bedroom. The apartment is empty, the door to Viktor and Katsuki’s room wide open, Makkachin waiting patiently in front of his food bowl. Viktor at least fed both their pets before he took off.

There’s a message blinking on his phone. Yuri doesn’t think, and swipes it open.

_Спасибо, Юрий_ , is all it says, and he knows it’s not from his Viktor.

 

 

 

He texts Katsuki, _Idiot_ _heading your way._

Then he puts Misha in her carrier, gathers up Makkachin’s food bowl and his favorite toy, and puts the lead on him. Viktor may have finagled his way into an APEC card somehow that lets him fly to Japan on a whim without a visa, but Makkachin is a different story, and Viktor loves his dog enough that he’d never leave, not even for Katsuki, without having made arrangements.

He delivers Makkachin to Yakov, takes Misha back to Lilia’s, then packs a bag. He doesn’t ask, just sends Otabek a picture of his plane tickets.

Otabek texts back, _Look for me at the airport_.

Yakov will be furious; preseason starts in only a few days. Lilia will probably call him weak. Katsuki and Mila will both look at him with big, sad eyes, and Viktor—well, who the fuck really knows with him. Yuri doesn’t want their lectures or their pity, because he knows what he would have chosen, if he could have, and that hasn’t changed. Sometimes you have to give up something you want, in order to get something you want more.

It just sucks that the only person who understood the _worth_ of what he wants, is gone.

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Part two has been posted, and is the epilogue.
> 
> Comments make my day and week and month, and you can also [reblog on tumblr](http://foxfireflamequeen.tumblr.com/post/158872220073/heres-to-the-glory-still-to-be)!


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